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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive 
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"That Glorious Song 
OF Old" 



BY 



EDMUND HAMILTON SEARS 



ILLUSTRATED BY ALFRED FREDERICKS 

ENGRAVED UNDER THE SUPERVISION OF 
GEORGE T. ANDREW 



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BOSTON 
LEE AND SHEPARD, PUBLISHERS 

NEW YORK: CHARLES T. DILLINGHAM 
1883 



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Copyright, 1882, 
By Lee and Shepard. 



All 7-isrhts reserved. 



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University Press: 
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 



"THAT GLORIOUS SONG OF OLD" 

Is one of the sweetest of all the glad carols that echo " The Song of Bethlehem," — 
that grandest song of all the centuries, — whose recitative, sung by the archangel 
Gabriel, and whose chorus, voiced by a chosen choir of the heavenly host, was Jieard 
by the affrighted shepherds, while the " glory of the Lord shone round about them," 
as it broke upon the midnight silence of fair Judea ; and which has been answered by 
every recurring season for nearly two tliousand years, to b2 resumed again •' when He 
cometh in the glory of His Father, with the holy angels.". 



Edmund Hamilton Sears 

Was born April 7, iSio, at Sandisfield, a quaint old town nestled among the Berkshire 
hills in Western Massachusetts. 

With little aid from his family, and larger self-denial on his own part, he entered 
Union College, Schenectady, N. Y., where he was graduated at the age of twenty-four. 
Three years afterwards, in 1S37, he was graduated at Cambridge Divinity School. 

With most decided tastes for a literary career, his deep religious sentiment impelled 
him, from early boyhood, to the Christian ministry. 

He enjoyed this service amidst the quiet of the grand old towns of Lancaster, 
Wayland, and Weston, in Massachusetts, where he also found time to engage in those 
literary pursuits and studies which were so congenial to his taste, and for which, because 
of physical limitations, he finally withdrew from pastoral labors. He died in Weston, 
among his former parishioners, beloved and honored, Jan. 16, 1876. 

The limits of this note will not allow of an e.xtended reference to Dr. Sears's 
literary labors ; but of all his poetical jnoductions those by which he will be the 
longest remembered, — and which, by the right of a singular adaptedness, are the 
property of the Christian Church Universal, — are "The Angels' Song" of this volume, 
and "The Christmas Song," commencing, "Calm, on the listening ear of night." 



That Glorious song of old." 



7T came upon the midnight clear, 

That glorious song of old, 
From angels bending near the earth 

To touch their harps of gold ; 
" Peace on the earth, good will to men 

From Heaven's all-gracious King " — 
The world in solemn stillness lay 

To hear the angels sing. 

Still through the cloven skies they come 

With peaceful wings unfurled, 
And still their heavenly music floats 

O'er all the weary world ; 
Above its sad and lowly plains 

They bend on hovering wing, 
And ever o'er its Babel-sounds 

The blessed angels sing. 

But with the woes of sin and strife 
The world has suffered long ; 

Beneath the angel-strain have rolled 
Two thousand years of wrong ; 



And man, at war with man, hears not 
The love-song which they bring; — 

Oh, hush the noise, ye men of strife, 
And hear the angels sing ! 

And ye, beneath life's crushing load, 

Whose forms are bending low, 
Who toil along the climbing way 

With painful steps and slow, 
Look now ! for glad and golden hours 

Come swiftly on the wing ; — 
Oh, rest beside the weary road 

And hear the angels sing ! 

For lo ! the days are hastening on 

By prophet bards foretold, 
When with the ever circling years 

Comes round the age of gold ; 
When Peace shall over all the earth 

Its ancient splendors fling, 
And the whole world give back the song 

Which now the an?els sing. 



"THAT GLORIOUS SONG OF OLD." 



It came upon the midnight clear, 
That glorious song of old, 

From angels bending near the earth 
To touch their harps of gold ; 







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Peace on the earth, good-will to men 
From heaven's all-gracious Kine: " — 




The world in solemn stillness lay 
To hear the antrels sins:. 



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Still through the cloven skies they come 
With peaceful wings unfurled, 




And still their heavenly music floats 
O'er all the weary world ; 

Above its sad and lowly plains 
They bend on hovering wing, 




And ever o'er its Babel-sounds 
The blessed angfels sing:. 








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But with the woes of sin and strife 
The world has sufifered long ; 

Beneath the angel-strain have rolled 
Two thousand years of wrong ; 




And man, at war with man, hears not 
The love-song which they bring; — 




Oh, hush the noise, ye men of strife, 
And hear the an":els sins^ ! 



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And ye, beneath life's crushing load, 
Whose forms are bending low, 




Who toil along the climbing way 
With painful steps and slow, 



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Look now ! for glad and golden hours 
Come swiftly on the wing ; — 

Oh, rest beside the weary road 
And hear the angels sins:! 



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For lo ! the days are hastening on 
By prophet bards foretold, 

When with the ever circling" years 
Comes round the age of gold ; 




When Peace shall over all the earth 
Its ancient splendors fline^, 






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And the whole world give back the song 
Which now the angels sing. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

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